My garden soil is pretty thin above chalk. I know that this can cause some plants and trees problems and I've been working to improve the soil in some places. I hope that as the layers of the forest garden develop the soil will improve by itself, but in the first few years I am trying to add as much organic matter as possible to make sure that the plants get established.

I bought a soil pH test kit a few months ago and finally got around to using it. I scraped away the top few inches of soil and then dug up a sample of soil below that, put it in a container and let it dry out. Once it was dry I did the test using the kit. I took soil from two areas, one where I had been adding quite a lot of compost over a year or more and another which was unimproved. Both samples gave me a result of the highest pH on the scale which was 7.5. I'm guessing that they are at least that high. The unimproved soil is visibly more chalky and dried to a grey colour, the other was much darker so I think there must be some difference. Looks like I need a pH test kit with a wider range!